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Full transcript from interview with John Koufos. (July 13, 2021)
Marcus: What's up guys? It's your boy, Marcus Bullock. I'm super excited about this
episode of Marcus asks. I'm super pumped about it. I'm getting ready to let
john Come on in a second. Today we're going to be talking about jobs after
incarceration. So, some of you guys may have questions about how your
loved one should be looking for employment, I think concentration or what
you should be doing to help prepare them for that. And I'm one of the one
of our guests today, specifically works just around that. And so, I'm excited
to be able to join him in a second. so, john should be joined in any minute.
Please, please, please, please This one, this definitely wouldn't be a good
conversation without your comments or your questions. so, if you have
comments, or if you have questions about this topic, or any other topic
that we're talking about Marcus asks, please make sure you drop them in
comment section. I'm going to be reading them and monitor them as we
continue to have this conversation. But I wanted to be able to make sure
that we're very, very, very thoughtful about addressing some of the actual
issues that happen inside of the community. If you guys don't know, I'm
Marcus Bullock, I'm the CEO and founder of Flikshop. And my job is to be
able to make sure that I work hard as I don't know what to keep family
members connected to their incarcerated loved ones. And so, we do that
with a Flikshop app. And one of the things that we like doing and a part
of ensuring that we keep families connected, it's also connecting folks back
to resources or people that we think that they need to be connected to,
so, that they can, you know, help their loved one overcome this situation
of, you know, incarceration after, after, I mean, successful reentry after
incarceration. So, super excited about this, guys. I'm getting old George's
joint. I'm getting ready to let a man. so, I hope you guys enjoy the
competition. Please be mindful and make sure. And um, yeah, we’re
goanna gets into this conversation. Let's see if we can get john to join in a
second. Let's see here. It looks like john is joining. There he is.
John: I'm out of the Stone Age. Like I said, I created an Instagram account solely
to be with you, my friend.
Marcus: Oh, man, thank you so, much for joining us this evening, man.
John: Happy to be here.
Marcus: This is so, dope. I'm super excited to be able to have you here. Solo job.
One of the things that we like to do in our episodes of markets as is we like
to get straight into the conversation. And we'd like to be able to make sure
that we give our audience, our listeners, the viewers, here on it live,
eventually, we're going to be able to cut this all up. And we're going to post
it on our YouTube channel so, that folks can be able to watch this for many,
many days, months, and even years to come. And so, I think it's important
for them to know exactly who we're talking to when we open up these
kinds of conversations. so, let's take a quick minute, before we even jump
into the conversation if you will take a moment to introduce yourself. All
of you all that are here know if you don't, I'm Marcus Bullock, I'm the CEO
and founder of Flikshop. We built the technology to help keep our loved
ones connected during their incarceration periods. And then I'm joined
today by my homeboy john, whom I met I met up just a few years ago at
the White House. And it was interesting that that day at the White House,
and I told him that day I'm like, Listen, you know, anybody who I know who
has been in me shoes, and also wants to help contribute to helping people
successfully, we enter back into the community. I went in on one
supporting them and he said he wanted to do the same, which led us to
this conversation here. JOHN, take a minute. Introduce yourself, please to
listeners or viewers.
John: Sure. Well, thank you for having me, my friend. And yeah, it seems so, long
ago when you were up there with Kim Kardashian. Right, I thought you
were going to be the most popular guy there that and I was hoping to be
number two, and then you were number two, and I was like a distant third
way in the back. But anyway, I’m John Koufos. And I I'm the executive
director of a project called Safe Streets and second chances which is
housed it right on crime. Right on crime is a tremendous organization
responsible for leading the closure of 10 prisons in the state of Texas and
bringing criminal justice reform really across the country but to
conservative states. Before that, I was in New Jersey, I was the executive
director of the New Jersey reentry Corporation, helping former governor
Jim McGreevey builds that organization and build sites around the state.
Before way before that I was a criminal defense and civil rights lawyer for
about a decade. But the interesting part other than my legal career, was
the fact that I went to a state prison in New Jersey. But 10 years ago,
actually, it was June of 2011 I was driving My car drunk I was functional
alcoholic marker as you know, and we drive in my car drunk, hit somebody
hurt them try to live my way out of it until I turned myself in. Thanks, Good
Lord, that person would recover. Nothing, I did help that candidly. And I
would go deservedly go to prison for hurting that person causing that
drunk driving accident. And that would begin my ability to overcome
alcoholism. And it gave me a sense not just a purpose, but it gave me the
viewpoint that candidates candidly my clients were telling me about when
I was practicing law; they would tell me about how terrible the prison
system was how much it didn't help but I didn't think I could help as a
criminal defense lawyer and of course as any of us who've had criminal
defense lawyers know that I also thought I knew everything about this but
until that door closes behind you and they say yard out you know you don't
know anything about the system. And I was most moved Marcus by the
goodness I saw in prison you see everything in prison of course GOOD BAD
otherwise, but the goodness to some of the people in their cell mates I had
you know, nobody asked me for money, which was good. I was going
bankrupt, but I still had canteen nobody asked me for money, Marcus, but
nearly everybody asked me for a job. And I never ever forgot that. And that
conversation when conversations with those, those men at Bayside Street
prison in New Jersey catalyzed my desire to want to help I observed one
thing that really was there anything that repulsed me in prison but one
thing I just could not stomach was the fact that people were getting
paroled going to the halfway house and then being sent right back because
of some I don't want to curse on your on your live feed your BS, there some
for some bullshit fine or fee, you know, they couldn't afford it was a
criminalization of poverty, Marcus, that's what we were I was witnessing
every day, you report, you couldn't afford to stay out on the streets, you
were sent back and attack, and you serve the rest of your sentence out. so,
I know I was going to help with that. But I vowed when I got out, I would
do something about it with my legal network. And we created the state's
largest pro bono network, it was anywhere in the country at that point, to
restore driver's licenses mitigate fines and fees resulting over 400 drivers’
licenses restored 1000s of identity documents 10s of 1000s of dollars, fines
waived and 1000s of warrants cancelled. so, that's how I got my start and
reentry, what was doing that you know, and had I never gone to prison, I
would have never been able to see that with my own eyes and God Willing
Fashion a solution to it with my own two hands.
Marcus: Now this is so, interesting, man, like, you know, I think that there's so,
many different stories, I'm sure that you can say the same right when you
met people while you were there. But you know, people talking about their
journey into handcuffs. And then now, you know, after they get out the
work that they decide to do, no matter what industry they decide to
pursue. Like it's so, interesting when you hear the stories, right. One of the
things that is very important to me is like really just changing the narrative
for the people that are coming out of prison and be like, this is not like a
one-line person. This is not a monolithic way of you know, living people are
like just strictly like one way going, in prison or out of prison. We're all
humans. And I think that this is one of the reasons why I'm so, passionate
about wanting to be able to make sure that we keep the families connected
is always because its sensitive humanity, like how you described like, even
the people who you met when you were there and how they didn't want
to extra bread, but it was excellent jobs. Like it just shows like the level of
humanity that we all have a desire to, like want to come home and win.
Sometimes I think it's centered around social capital and resources. How
do you see like the reentry path for me specifically, because you're in this
career, right? Like, I mean, people that have been in prison like me, or
some of our, you know, customers who use our technology, or the people
who support our company, right? They understand like, you, you know, the
dead berries were people that are coming home from prison, but because
you’re specifically in the word, like one you have your own reentry path
and when it was like for you to like go from an attorney that was practicing
law to like handcuffs and then coming home and just trying to figure out
how to redirect your career. Like what have you seen from others and
some of the challenges that people have had after coming home from
prison?
John: Oh, I mean, they're so many you know, before I answered that, I just want
to I want to point something out touching on and you know this because
you started this company, but, you know, I remember when they did mail
call, and I always got mail because well, somebody had some money. He
was suing me God. You know what my house was getting foreclosed.
Marcus: People stay with you while you were in prison.
John: Well, foreclosure actions on my house, the car is being repossessed.
There's like various legal actions coming in. I had settled the lawsuit related
to the car.
Marcus: For instance, like it shows like life still was going on, even though you were
in.
John: I'm sorry. Keep going. Sure. so, I got mail every day, I may not have wanted
the mail I got, but I got it. And you know, you just look at people's faces
when their name is not called every day for mail. Right. And your
organization, your company creates that that necessary linkage, which by
the way, is critical. The reason Hathaway right, and you know that and I
think you're the people viewing know that, but it's worth saying,
specifically, was the barrier. So, you know, people think that when you're,
you know, when you're a criminal defense lawyer, that gets jammed up
that, you know, your life is just going to continue normally when you get
out of prison, but actually, you know, you're in many ways, you know, I had
very good friends. But I also was radioactive to large sections of the
business community, right, because they didn't care that, you know, I was
perhaps one of them before, right. The fact of the matter was, I was a felon
now, and I use that word because that's the way I was you. You know,
people first language certainly not was not a thing when I got out. And
Marcus: Definitely not me that yeah,
John: Yeah. Yeah. And so, you know, the barriers that that, I mean, I faced them
myself, again, my home was foreclosed upon, I had nowhere to go when
parole said, well, if you want to leave, you have to show us an address. I
was fortunate enough and privileged to have a law school roommate, let
me move in with him, right. But if I didn't have housing, I was sitting till God
knows what until they probably lost my date. As I started to do the work,
you know, and I started, you know, like any lawyer would just looking at
the legal problem. Going back to that driver's license issue, you know, you
did you have people that don't even have identification to prove who they
are. so, that means a number of things, right? Let's just stick with that
issue. Before I get to the rest of the discrete issues. If you don't have
identification, and you will, and proles tells you to get a job, well, you're
not getting a job, because you can't complete an I nine form of
identification, you're never going to get housing, you can't go to the doctor,
if you're in the throes of addiction, or you need your, your medicine, you're
not going to see a doctor because you have no identification, you're not
going to do anything. so, you know, what happens then is you have people
who are, you know, administratively barred from their own recovery, and
their own reentry? Then you get into the housing providers, and I'll use
myself as an example. so, I went to get an apartment in Hoboken, New
Jersey before I moved to DC, because by law school buddy lived in
Hoboken. I couldn't get anyone to rent an apartment to me, I have four
cosigners. For it all, you know, bank, general counsel's etc. Nobody would
rent the Fallon John Koufos, an apartment that carried over when we
moved to DC, our first apartment and I can say it now, we bought a house
here now. But our first apartment was as being my wife's name because
they even DC as progressive as it claims to be would not let me be on the
lease. On the first year, I'd make a big stink about it. That doesn't, I'm going
to go through a few and then I'm going to get to jobs, right? Because job
Marcus: You're going. It's a good stuff
John: It is the number one problem. so, take little things, right? Think of
something you've never most people think of life insurance, right? so, I
have my you know, I get married, I have a two-year-old girl, my little girls
would be two, two years old next week. And you want to get life insurance
when you're having a baby in case you die. so, the baby will be okay. I
couldn't even get life insurance. Right? Nobody would insure me, and I
have no medical conditions to prevent me from getting life insurance. It
was because I had a criminal record. If I didn't have the access to the legal
community that I had, because of who I was, I would have never ever
gotten life insurance. I was able to get the right people on the phone purely
because of that. There's nothing more unfair. And there's nothing that that
crystallizes the privilege that exists more than that, right? Because you
don't know anybody. You're out of luck. Now, let's talk about jobs. Right?
So, you know, the, the, the problem is, is that employers typically don't
follow the science, right? so, they follow the fact that they may have not
known anyone who have gotten jammed up before. They may have certain
pre, you know, prejudgments and prejudices on the subject. But what
happens though, what happens is, people who have criminal records if
they're even allowed to be in the line, or at the back of the line in most
situations, and you know, this is this is something that, you know, I got out
of prison in 13. so, I'm not talking about 100 years ago. so, what happens
is, you can't get a job and then what happens is employers They have
businesses to run. so, if they have one bad experience with an employee,
right, who happen to have a criminal record, nobody else gets a job from
that point forward. But the fascinating part is because they're hiring with
their gut and not talking to people in the criminal justice movement, like
yourself, or me or people to society for human resources management,
they're talking to those experts. What is what is happening here is that you
may take someone out who is in early recovery, right? so, a person has
particular addiction, their early recovery, well, the science is going to tell
you that their relapse may be a part of their reentry, right, that relapse
happens for people. so, if they relapse and become and don't become a
good employee, that's not reflective of everybody else. But people with
the lowest recidivism rates are people convicted of murder, a couple of
reasons. Number one, they're older than everybody else, in all likelihood,
because they were stuck doing so, much time on the charge. so, because
with age being the number one predictor of recidivism, you're safe, if
you're an employee, your safest bet is probably hiring a person convicted
of murder as opposed to someone who might have been a recovering
alcoholic, and I use that being one. so, thankfully, though, Marcus, we've
seen private industry start to take the lead. And you know, people don't
like to admit this, but one of the most catalyzing corporations on the planet
for this was Koch Industries, right? People gave the Koch brothers a really
bad name, for whatever political reasons they might have done. so, but
Koch, when Koch Industries said we should be in the second chance hiring
game, the business community took notice and the business community
followed. Give me an example when we were in New Jersey, New Jersey,
very, you know, blue state progressive state. I call it fake progressive in a
lot of ways because they'll tell you, it's progressive, right? They'll tell you,
they're with you. And then when it comes down to doing something, you
know, you might as well be in Alabama anyway. But I, you know, with when
we were doing an employment opportunity summit in New Jersey, with
Governor Christie, back in 2017, the general counsel of the time Koch
Industries, Mark Holden, came all the way up to keynote this for us, right.
And first of all, he had probably much more important things to do with
that, where I would have thought it would be more important, but he was
selflessly Mark Holden selflessly devoted himself to this issue, and so, does
when he took the stage, other CEOs, other general counsel's other folks
heard him speaking their language. And then they wanted to hire people,
the highest spike we ever had in employment as a New Jersey reentry
Corporation was Mark Holden was there because the entire business
community started to give our people a chance. And once they gave our
people a chance, they realize that more often than not, you were going to
do better than you would with just an arrow or the same or better than
with an employee off the street. Reason being our population is, you know,
Marcus, you know, is, I mean, we're loyal. Right? Because nobody wants to
give us a chance at almost anything. so, we're much more loyal to
employers, and I think the average person coming off the street, our
knowledge base is obviously having a different have a different type. And
the other piece is, is we appreciate opportunity in ways other dope,
because most of the doors are closed to us. so, I think that that all that to
say that thanks to people like Koch Industries, the folks that you know, cut
50 and dream core CCI or the just trust it is now Arnold ventures, etc. so,
all of those groups started to catalyze change. And now we see folks if you
can believe this business roundtable, which is comprised of the biggest
CEOs on Earth, on Earth, JP Morgan, you know, CVS, Aetna, etc. These
corporations are now through business roundtable have formed a second
chance business coalition with the Society for human resources
management. so, by doing that, what they've done is they bring in, they
brought our issue to the people who have endless amounts of influence.
And I think that is that is one of the greatest victories, unsung victories of
the criminal justice movement. And candidly, people like you, right are the
reason that a lot of these big corporations will have the confidence to go
out on a limb for our population, they see Marcus Bullock the see Flik-
shop, they're excited about the see the potential, and they're all looking
carefully for the next mark as well. They never looking for the next john,
but they're all looking for the next view. And the beauty of this is that we
have a business community today. That's excited about the issue. Now it's
on us to do two things. We have to keep them excited. Well, three things
we have to keep them excited. We have to make sure that we are working
with reentry programs to provide them the best possible candidate we
want them raving about people with criminal records. We want them
saying they're the best employees we ever had. And then of course, we
have to make sure the accountability is there, and then they're actually
hiring the people, they say they're going to hire.
Marcus: Let's go with that. Let's stick with that. Last one. What are some of the one?
I wanted to go back to that. I want to I want to go back to some of those
companies that you name that are forming this, you know, this this round
table that are being intentional about this second chance hiring practice
that is kind of sort of I'm starting to hear it sweeping across the company
across country. Can you name What are some of those companies that are
being thoughtful about this second, chance, hiring and commitment?
John: Sure. Well, Koch Industries has always been that though we should start
there. Among large corporations always been there. But when you're
looking at business roundtable in the second chance business coalition, JP
Morgan, has hired people, you know, as I think they're up to a few
1000,nationwide, led by Jamie diamond CEO of JP Morgan. Yeah, but Eaton
, which is a huge, you know, manufacturing company, which is based in
Ohio, if I recall, in fact, their CEO, co-chairs that you're seeing CVS, start to
get into this space, as well, and you're seeing the energy industry get into
this, you know, in a bigger way sought a lot during the Trump
administration, because candidly, the energy sector was in a different
financial position was booming, then you couldn't find anybody to work on
oil rigs or any of those places. so, the energy sector, and those monstrous
corporations in the energy sector started to hire more people. I can tell
you; the really exciting thing is to use a What about if you're in Newark,
New Jersey, right? If you're in Newark, New Jersey, and your biggest
employer, are places are big business, but they're your biggest sort of
community employers or hospital systems, you can't work in a hospital
because yeah, have a CDS charge. Right. One of the exciting things that
we're seeing places like, like our RWJ Barnabas, the second largest hospital
system in New Jersey do is they recognize that you can't hire someone with
a particular record, say as a, you know, to handle the, you know, the
narcotics in the hospital, right? You can't be around certain patients,
depending on what the regulations are. But what they're willing to do is
they're analyzing their supply chains, right? so, what they're doing is
they're being intentional about hiring, perhaps, the food vendor, for
example, in some of the hospitals will be run by someone who is formerly
incarcerated, right, or someone from the community. The same with the
people who provide any number of services to hospital, whether it's the
cleaning services, whether it's the uniforms, whether it's the some of the
support and training staff, some of the medical billing and coding, right. so,
you're seeing industries that can't get into the fight, doing it in other ways.
I think that's really exciting. You know, there was a great woman, if you
ever have chance to meet her from New Jersey, named Micheline Davis,
she was the vice president of corporate affairs there. And she and barrier
Strauss is the CEO are two of the reasons why that launched.
Marcus: You know, one, I think this is so, interesting, as I think about some of the
opportunities being unlocked, I mean, you we if you leave it up to like the
with the media will betray or forget that which will lead them to like the
people who will want to read, you're talking about what the opportunities
are, before they come home, you would, you would believe that there
aren't any that are available for people that are coming home from prison,
what I'm hearing from you on that one, there's a growing trend of folks
who are being thoughtful about giving Second Chance hiring, you know,
bringing second chance hiring practices into their companies, but they're
also entire industries that are continuing to snowball this effort. One of the
questions I kind of have for you here is specifically around the people that
are in the sales and how, you know, knowing that while you will give an
example of a Hospital in Newark, but you know, there's people that are
in Palo Alto, you know, in the tech, you don't want to come over to tech
industries, all the people that are in Florida, who are you know, thinking
about how they integrate themselves back into the agriculture industry, or
whatever the case maybe you no matter where you are demographically,
right? I mean, geographically. One of the things the one of the questions I
have for to eggs for the community of the listeners are, how should you
prepare yourself for getting back to work? When you're getting ready to
come home? If you're sending a sale? Now, what do you do to prepare
yourself to get back to work? And then the second part of that question is,
how should the loved ones the family members help to support that
preparation to get your loved one back into one of these amazing careers
opportunities after incarceration?
John: Sure, great question. so, I think the number one thing and again, this is the
this is the pencil pusher lawyer in me, right, but the number you got to
make sure that your administrative barriers are handled and what are your
administrative barriers where we began Right, do you have open warrants
anywhere. And if you do, make sure that somebody is contacting the court
for you to do that don't rely on the prison social worker or any of that. If
you have, if you have people on the streets if you have no buddy, then you
have to, right? Contact your legal aid organizations, your reentry programs,
or write to me at write on crime. And I'll find you a local lawyer to help you
out.
Marcus: The American Job Center,
John: Yes, they used to be called one stop career centers. And, and I had the
privilege of helping run one in Jersey City, the reentry side one few years
back. so, this is all free training. so, the idea then is that you want the loved
ones to be able to help someone get into that right. The other thing I think
your loved ones, the loved ones should be thinking about is understanding
the adjustment period, right? No matter how many letters we write and
say, hey, you know, on day one, I'm ready to start working, that's probably
not the reality. On day one, you have to see how your stomach handles
human food. Again, because you've eaten growl for X amount of time,
right? On day one, you have to not jump when a loud noise happens near
you. Right, you have to you have to sleep in a bed if you have that option.
That is you're not if you have loved ones to go into. And the loved ones
have to I hope we'll create a little bit of space for that doesn't have to be
forever didn't have to be two months, you have to be a month, just give a
week or two, for someone to get a phone to understand how to use the
phone to say hello to people they haven't seen in a while, right? Let them
get their feet under them a little bit. And I think you'll see much greater
success. so, loved ones can help in that planning process. And person has
an addiction history. And it's going to be a condition of parole, you need to
get that handled right at the front end. Because I'm living proof that you
know that will kill you and grab somebody else faster than almost anything
else. It also will be making you render you unable to participate in any sort
of real reentry program. The final piece of it, I think, has to do with making
sure, that a person knows that their first job out is not necessarily going to
be their last job out. And that's really important because you can go to the
American Job Center, say you want to be a coder and they have coding that
there, right? while you're doing your coding, you may need a job. And you
may work in some industry, you're not that thrilled about right. And I think
you just have to remember that if you can show someone that there are
ladders of opportunity to get to where you want to get people will. People
are self-motivated, they will handle this themselves. I think a lot of the rub
I saw, or I've seen working in direct services in reentry is the fact that you
get put in a warehouse pushing a pallet jack and no one ever tells you can
do anything else. And candidly, no one ever creates an opportunity for you
to do anything else. If you have to work in a kitchen, you know work to be
goat, take the cooking class, the American Job Center become the chef and
then you can become the owner like a chef Jeff or if you have that kind of
talent. And I think that's there's a psychological game to this as well as an
operational game. And I think if the to run concurrently, you are goanna
see much better results.
Marcus: This is incredible. This is amazing jewels that you're dropping right here.
Oh, you know, I know we're running out of time. But I want to I got a couple
of questions I want to be able to hit. Specifically, one of the folks in our
comments wanted to know; how would you describe the impact of the first
or the second step acts.
John: So, the first step back, you know, the, the first step back, and people don't
like to give it any credit because it was President Trump, right? And if you
don't, if first doesn't like President Trump, they you know, they start to go
apoplectic if you say he did anything well, but he happened to do criminal
justice really well. And this is what I will say about the Trump legacy on the
first step back, the most important part of the first step back is political.
And here's why. It gave red state governors and had little interest or were
politically worried about doing criminal justice reform, the cover to do so.
You saw red state governors hard on crime Governor's look around and
say, hmm, well, if Trump did it, and people like Trump, and people might
state like Trump, I can do this too. He gave them a pathway through the
first step back to do what's right. Right. And what's Andrew restore dig,
there's some level of dignity. At the same time, the first step back,
obviously, you know, did some great things on crack cocaine disparities.
With the retroactivity, the compassionate release aspect of it was sorely
needed. You know, you have people, you have some prisons that look like
a, you know, a nursing home right now, people are no threat to anybody,
and they're being held. so, I think that was the real import of the first step.
There's tremendous law on its face between, you know, prerelease
custody and all the all the technical part that will put you to sleep if you
read it, right. It's a very dense Ville. But the real anyone, the criminal justice
movement, should know that that is the law that gave cover too hard on
crime folks that did not want to do touch this issue before and then they
started.
Marcus: There's going to we got we got like two more minutes that's going to the
right, how would you How would you describe the second step?
John: So, I think I think that the next step that we need to do refer and Cory
Booker's is one of the people spearheading this senator Booker is second
look, act right. Second Look, just the quick version of second look, is that it
gives the person a chance to go back before the judge and a very long they
have a 25-year sentence, you get to go back for the judge within say, 10
years, the judge can see if you've tried to do any better. And if you're
appropriate for re sentencing, I think that's a great way to right size, some
of these exorbitant sentence things and mitigate some of the disastrous
racial disparities in our system.
Marcus: Now, this is good stuff. This is good stuff. I mean, I'm sure folks wanted to
hear the answers that like they're reading about first step and second load,
but like they wanted to be able to hear someone else be able to break
down some language that they speak. I have one more quick question. And
then I'm goanna give you some nice long words if you would say what
some of the hot industries are, that you're hearing about, for people that
are looking for jobs that are running around the country, right. And I know
that each one of our local geographical areas has their own hot spaces. But
what trends are you seeing?
John: The great, I'm so, glad you asked that you should anyone who has a port
near them or anything controlled by a port authority or a twit card
transportation worker identification credential, one of the things I've been
very lucky to do is I've been working with the Biden administration on
streamlining the process for people with criminal records, most TWIC card
is what you need to work on a port, right. And working on a port could
mean any number of employers there could be the energy industry, etc.
But the idea behind the twit card is that the, it's for so, long, people just
survive a record, I can't get a twit card. That's not true. It's just the process
is a real pain in the ass right now, right for people with criminal records.
But we're working to develop methods to streamline that we have to pilot
in a few places. But I would encourage anyone with a criminal record who's
been out for over a year because you do not usually need that buffer
period to look for the better paying jobs. The ports are usually union jobs,
they usually pay more than the community jobs as well. And they usually
have career growth and they're any number of things like everything food
service to heavy manufacturing, to the oil and tight fitting and gas
industries.
Marcus: Thank you. so, these are incredible, incredible resources. Gentlemen,
utilize word. One of the big questions that you know that I have personally
are right, what do I say to my best friend, or my cousin or one of my
nephews who are coming out of a sale, and I'm not really as connected?
They're not like the person that I'm assuming of you know, the
responsibility for it right? But I want to see them when they come home.
What are some of the ways that I can support them, right? I'm not the one
that's like they're not living with me, right? They aren't. I'm not like, you
know, giving them a bunch of cash, you know, I'm not, you know,
employing them straight out the door, right, like, but I do want to help
support them when they come home. I also may have some resources at
me at my job, right? But I don't know should I connect them to those
resources and my job? Should I like, you, how I want to help you with your
resume? Do I? What do I do? Like? How do I support them?
John: Sure. Well, listen, all of us know that the number one-way people get jobs
is by knowing somebody, right. And that's not that's not a joke. That's the
reality of it. Right? If you know, somebody, usually you're called before the
job opening even happens. so, what I like to do, and when I encourage
everyone to do are to think about your networks right now, but be very
judicious about your networks, and be very protective of your networks in
the following way. If the person you're talking to is trying to do the right
thing, open your network to them, you may not want to open up a network
within your own office because of you know, some people don't like to
refer people within their own office. But you know, people who hire right
I know people who hire, and everybody probably knows somebody who
hires have that conversation with them, right? Because go to bat for people
where you can, right, where it's where it's comfortable, and sometimes
going to bat is hard advocacy, right? saying, look, this is right guys, solid
guy known for a lot of years. If you did, sometimes it's, hey, listen, I know
that he's on the level. I know he's doing the right thing. I know his mom is
helping them where they can, and his grandmother is helping him all he
needs his foot in the door, can you help him out? And you'd be amazed
that when john or Marcus or somebody else comes to somebody and says
that how many doors can open? And there's nothing wrong with that,
because that's how most of the people get their jobs in it. Anyway, you
know, how many lawyers do you think get hired blindly, right? Somebody
knows them and says, I know this guy from the prosecutor's office, give
them a call, and let's bring him on. so, we should really be looking to use
our networks where appropriate. If we do that, we're also going to create
momentum that normalizes the hiring of people with criminal records.
Marcus: Man, this is though, john, thank you again for joining us, man. Having us
having a conversation with me, you guys that have joined us, you know,
thank you for joining us for another episode of Marcus as well. You know,
we tried to be able to have real conversations, and specifically with people
who are directly impacted by the justice system, right? Like we are the ones
who want to we know what we want to know, we know what questions
we have, we know the conversations that we want to see had, right. so, if
you want to join us a future, you will have quotes for john Oh, jump in his
DMS. Make sure you follow him on Instagram and ask them those
questions that you may have not wanted to eggs in the public, right? If you
want to be able to find a seat or listen to a topic that you think is going to
impact your loved one, jump into Flikshops VMs. Our team is more than
happy to figure out ways to be able to continue to support our community.
When we hear influx of offices, we want to make sure that we're reducing
recidivism, when people come out of prison, we want to make sure that
we keep help keep them out. And we're going to do everything that's
humanly possible to be able to make that happen. It wouldn't happen
though, without our community that people like you guys. And folks like
you, john, thank you so, much again for joining us this evening. You took
so, much time out of your schedule this tonight. You show me up you know
i mean everyone knows I wear a T shirt every day you show me up with an
amazingly tight necktie, which is super bad, but I'm goanna forgive you for
this time. I hope you'll come back and join us for another conversation in
the future.
John: Anytime my friends Thanks for everything you do, have a great night
Marcus: Absolutely, man. You do the same. Talk soon. See you guys later. Thank
you, guys, for joining us.